Trump picks Mulvaney as acting chief of staff
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Friday picked budget director Mick Mulvaney to be his acting chief of staff, ending a chaotic search in which several top contenders took themselves out of the running for the job.
“Mick has done an outstanding job while in the Administration,” Trump tweeted. “I look forward to working with him in this new capacity as we continue to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Trump added that his current chief of staff, John Kelly, will be staying until the end of the year. “He is a GREAT PATRIOT and I want to personally thank him for his service!” Trump wrote.
Trump’s first pick for the job, Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff Nick Ayers, took himself out of the running last weekend and decided to leave the White House instead. The decision caught the president and many senior staffers by surprise, and Trump soon found that others he considered front-runners were not interested in the job.
It was not immediately clear why the president decided to make Mulvaney’s appointment temporary. One senior White House official said there was no time limit on the appointment and Mulvaney would fill the role of chief of staff indefinitely, regardless of the “acting” title.
Key to his selection: Mulvaney and the president get along and the president likes him personally. Additionally, Trump prized the former congressman’s knowledge of Capitol Hill and political instincts as the White House prepares for a Democraticcontrolled House and the president’s upcoming reelection campaign.
The decision came suddenly. Trump had grown frustrated with the length of the search and the growing perception that no one of stature wanted the job, according to one person familiar with his thinking.
Mulvaney received the news before the president tweeted his announcement. They spoke face to face Friday afternoon at a meeting that was supposed to be about the budget and spoke by phone later in the evening, according to a second White House official. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
“This is a tremendous honor,” Mulvaney tweeted. “I look forward to working with the President and the entire team. It’s going to be a great 2019!”
Mulvaney, who will be Trump’s third chief of staff, will now take on his third job in the administration. He is head of the Office of Management and Budget, and for a time simultaneously led the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
WASHINGTON — Shaken and facing a prison term, President Donald Trump’s longtime personal lawyer said Friday that Trump directed him to buy the silence of two women during the 2016 campaign because he was concerned their stories of alleged affairs with him “would affect the election.” He says Trump knew the payments were wrong.
Michael Cohen — who for more than a decade was a key power player in the Trump Organization and a fixture in Trump’s political life — said he “gave loyalty to someone who, truthfully, does not deserve loyalty.” Cohen spoke in an interview with ABC that aired Friday on “Good Morning America.” Cohen said that “of course” Trump knew it was wrong to make the hush-money payments, but he did not provide any specific evidence or detail in the interview. Federal law requires that any payments made “for the purposes of influencing” an election must be reported in campaign finance disclosures.
Speaking to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, Cohen appeared shaken over the series of events that swiftly took him from Trump’s “fixer” to a man facing three years in prison.
“I am done with the lying,” Cohen said. “I am done being loyal to President Trump.”
May aims to rescue Brexit plan; EU says ball’s in UK’s court
BRUSSELS — Prime Minister British Theresa May launched a rescue mission for her ailing Brexit deal Friday, after the European Union rebuffed her request to sweeten the divorce agreement so she can win over hostile lawmakers at home.
EU leaders meeting in Brussels showed little appetite to resolve May’s Brexit impasse for her, saying the U.K. Parliament must make up its mind. The choice was either back the Brexit agreement or send Britain tumbling out of the bloc in March without a deal and into unknown economic chaos.
“There is one accord, the only one possible,” French President Emmanuel Macron said at the end of a twoday summit. He said it was “the British parliament’s time” to decide whether to accept or reject it.
The Brexit gridlock has left Britain’s future looking like a high-stakes gamble with a dizzyingly wide range of possible outcomes. There could be an orderly or a disorderly Brexit. May’s Conservative government could fall and an early election be held. Britain could make a last-minute request to the EU to give it more time and not leave the bloc on March 29. Some people are even pressing for the U.K. to hold a second referendum on Britain’s EU